


Present Joy

by SunlitStone



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: AU Futurefic, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Post-Book: Memory, background Ivan Vorpatril/Byerly Vorrutyer, except with Memory also not having had Laisa, kind of like, some discussion of political manoeuvring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-17 01:28:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29092053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SunlitStone/pseuds/SunlitStone
Summary: He didn't realize until six years after Ivan and Byerly's wedding—at one of his and Gregor's mostly-weekly dinners, looking over at Gregor's small amused smile and the crinkling laugh lines around his eyes.Oh, Iwantthat,he thought.Then he realized what he was thinking.
Relationships: Gregor Vorbarra/Miles Vorkosigan
Comments: 5
Kudos: 25
Collections: Fandom Trumps Hate 2020





	Present Joy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jantique](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jantique/gifts).



He didn't realize until six years after Ivan and Byerly's wedding—at one of his and Gregor's mostly-weekly dinners, looking over at Gregor's small amused smile and the crinkling laugh lines around his eyes. _Oh, I_ want _that,_ he thought.

Then he realized what he was thinking.

"Miles?" Gregor said, after a long moment. 

Miles had frozen with his fork in his mouth. He'd taken his bite with a flourish, smugly punctuating the joke he'd known would make Gregor laugh—because he'd been working on it for just that all week, dear God, how had he not realized before? 

And now the laughter was gone from Gregor's eyes, brow wrinkled instead in concern. No, damnit, thought Miles, come back, I want you—

He wanted all kinds of things. How hadn't he known it before?

He made himself swallow, put down the fork. "I'm fine," he promised. "I just had a realization—give me a moment."

"Of course." Gregor's brow cleared, and he sat back, amusement and curiosity returning to his eyes. Miles spared a moment to wonder what those eyes might look like if Miles were, say, kissing him—very good, he thought, he'd bet anything that desire was a very good look on Gregor—then wrenched his thoughts back on track. Focus, boy.

He was in love with Gregor. He was in _love_ with _Gregor_ , dear God preserve him. At least he wouldn't have to convince him to move to Barrayar, ha. And no wonder he'd made no move to finding a Countess, galactic or Imperium-native, in the last—how long _had_ this been going on?

He'd been in love by the time By and Ivan had gotten married. Six years at least, hell. And how long had it been since these dinners were the highlight of his week, since he'd started to want to make Gregor smile not just out of worry for his liegelord and friend, but from the sheer joy of it? Gregor, _Gregor_!

And did Gregor love him? No, that was the wrong question; Miles had always known the answer to that one, knowledge bedded so deep in his understanding of the world he'd never even thought to question it. Was Gregor _in love_ with him?

He cast a quick glance at the warmth on Gregor's face, watching Miles in his turn. It was—not impossible. Damnit, Gregor was a past master of reserve, he'd never find out that way.

Gregor was almost forty-five, and not yet married, despite quite a lot of anxiety, hope, and pressure from his various advisors and attendants. In retrospect, Miles thought, he should have realized something when he had begun to sympathize less strongly with them and more with Gregor.

No, damnit, he wasn't going to find out this way. He thought briefly of some great campaign of seduction or infiltration—or maybe he could ask his mother, there was a thought. But Gregor, unfortunately, knew him as well as anyone. There was nothing Miles could reveal to him at this stage, no new angle that would make Gregor want him if he didn't already. And he suspected, glumly, he knew what his mother would say—oh God, he was going to have to tell his parents. _Later._

No, there was only one thing to do. Full frontal assault—fine Dendarii hillman tradition, eh? He looked over at Gregor. Gregor looked back, lifting his eyebrows in inquiry. "Gregor," said Miles. "Will you marry me?"

It was Gregor's turn to freeze. But for a brief moment—yes! thought Miles. There had been hunger in those eyes, he was sure of it.

Gregor was looking at Miles more closely now, behind the lingering shock. "You mean it. Miles..." he trailed off.

"No, listen to me." Miles pressed on. "The important thing is the heir vote, if we can get that everything else will fall into line behind it—no one loves the uncertainty we have now, if everyone thinks everyone else will recognize the heir, they'll want it to work just so things are stable. And the Council's not as conservative as it was in Da's day, there's already been a couple of heirs recognized since we got the marriages through. Andrei and Cassio are expecting in a couple of months, no one thinks their son will have trouble being recognized—Ivan tells me By gets Lord By'd almost everywhere in the capital now—"

He paused. Gregor's expression was—warm, familiar, fond, full of recognition; an affectionate cousin of the look he'd come to know on many different faces over the years, usually accompanied by "oh, _Miles_ ". But beyond that, from the deep quiet recesses of Gregor's heart, there seemed to be something else: a profound and dawning joy.

"And you love me," Gregor finished. It was gentle, but there was more of that joy to it.

"—and I love you," Miles agreed, and watched the joy spread from Gregor's eyes out across the whole rest of his body. How long had Gregor loved him back? And would Gregor have ever have said anything, if he himself had never confessed? No, he knew the answer to that second question; the first, he decided, could be explored later.

And—"you love me _back_ ," he said. Somehow saying it out loud made it real; his own, answering joy lit inside him, and he found himself beaming helplessly at Gregor. At the man he loved, who loved him _back_! ha! Take that, he thought, at their as-yet uncertain opponents. We love each other. We can win.

"I should ask you if you're sure," said Gregor, "but I know you." He paused for a moment, then abruptly stood and took his chair, moving it around to the side of the table. He took his seat again, then held his hand, palm up, in gentle offer; Miles took it, and lost a moment to contemplation of what other touching they might do, hands on each other's bodies. Gregor squeezed it. "Miles—sell me."

"Alys will back us, of course," said Miles. She wouldn't be thrilled—one of the reasons she'd supported Ivan and By's wedding quite as thoroughly as she had, he'd suspected, was what being married to a man would do to anyone's desire to use Ivan as a pawn in Imperial schemes, an advantage Gregor's own marriage to Miles would somewhat negate. On the other hand, at this point he rather thought she would accept Gregor marrying his teapot if they could get a legitimate heir out of it—and formidable as she was, Aunt Alys was far from immune to sentiment. "That gets us Vorgarin, Vorpinski, and Vorvolinkyn, all the rest of her crowd." He paused. "Vorinnis might be trouble, but I think I can talk him around." 

Gregor's lips twitched. "That, I don't doubt." He squeezed Miles' hand in his. Miles grinned involuntarily back at him and forged on.

"Dono's group will mostly be with us, and that means Vorbataille, and that means—"

"Vortienne. Clever, Miles." 

Vortienne only voted with Dono's crowd half the time—and with the staunchest conservatives the rest of the time, an interesting sort of man—and he didn't approve of men marrying, well, men marrying other men, but Vorbataille had saved his life. "Vorbataille will call in the favour for this, no question. And Henri will vote with us, or course, and with him and Vorbataille I think we can get Vorville, and that's not nothing—and Rene will vote with us, of course, and he's got some influence."

"Hmmm." Gregor was stroking his thumb across Miles' hand, almost absent-mindedly. "There's enough people who are, let's say, looking forward to an heir—" who are desperate for an heir, Miles mentally translated—"I think we should be able to get the Progressives with that base, even peel off some of the Conservatives." His thumb stilled. "Vorhalas won't be happy."

Vorhalas, still trekking on despite his many years, still a man of great influence. Miles winced involuntarily. Vorkosigan blood in Gregor's heir, "not happy" was something of an understatement. And yet—he thought back, god how many years ago was it now? to that memorable afternoon he'd convinced Vorhalas not to pull him up on charges of breaking Vorloupulous' Law. Naismith blood, too. And a child. 

"I think I can bring him around," he said quietly. "Not to lobby in our favour, you understand. But he won't vote against."

"Oh? —all right, then." They kept going down the list, squeezing each other's hand, talking with joy in their hearts; at one point Miles brought Gregor's hand to his lips and kissed it, and looked up into Gregor's blazing eyes. They looked at each other for a moment.

"Look," Miles said, "we can get it through, you know we can." He was barely paying attention to what he was saying. "God, Gregor—can I kiss you?"

Gregor smiled, small but entirely, fiercely happy. "Yes," he said. "And—yes, we can get it though. I'll marry you."

Perhaps, Miles thought, all his failed proposals had been practice for this last one; and then he was leaning in and kissing Gregor, his Emperor, the man he loved, and he could feel Gregor smiling under his mouth, and the time for thoughts was past them.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to welcome_equivocator, april_rainer, and my sister for helping me with this fic.
> 
> Jantique, I'm sorry this is so last-minute!!! It's been a heck of a year. I hope you enjoy the fic! <3


End file.
